


Undeniable Parallels

by pringlesaremydivision



Category: Captain America (Movies), Rhett & Link
Genre: Captain America AU, Link as Bucky Barnes, M/M, Rhett as Steve Rogers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-26
Updated: 2016-03-26
Packaged: 2018-05-29 06:54:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,460
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6363922
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pringlesaremydivision/pseuds/pringlesaremydivision
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>Best friends since childhood, Link Neal and Rhett McLaughlin were inseparable in both the schoolyard and the battlefield. Neal is the only Howling Commando to give his life in service of his country.</i>
</p><p>Or: the Rhink Stucky AU that no one asked for.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Undeniable Parallels

**Author's Note:**

> Just some self-indulgent AU waffling because if anyone could play out Stucky's story in real life, it'd be these two.

Rhett and Link grow up together, just like always, but they’re in North Carolina instead of Brooklyn, because they’re always gonna be southern boys at heart. And when the war breaks out Link signs up right away, but Rhett—he’s always been little and sickly, and no matter how many places he tries to sign up he gets a sympathetic head-shake if he’s lucky, a once-over and a laugh if he’s not, and then a ‘4F’ on his applications. He goes to Raleigh, to Charlotte, to Asheville and Chapel Hill, but he’s turned away every time.

All the while, Link is trying to spend the last little bit of time he’s got with Rhett—maybe the last little bit of time he has on earth; he knows how the fighting is going, and he’s not stupid; he knows how this could end—but Rhett’s preoccupied and angry and before they know it, Link’s number is up and he’s shipping out the next day.

God, he wants to tell Rhett he loves him, wants to cup his face and kiss him goodbye like he would his best girl, but it’s 1942 and they’re in North Carolina and that kind of stuff could get them both killed, so instead they just hug goodbye, Rhett telling Link not to win the war before he gets there. And Link’s so damn glad for Rhett’s various ailments because he’s terrified enough for himself; doesn’t know how he’d manage if he had to worry about Rhett being on the front line as well.

Those worries are well-founded, because Link’s captured in Italy and things happen that… he doesn’t quite remember, and when he tries, his brain goes all fuzzy, dark and splotchy around the edges, until all he’s left with is the memory of _pain_ , and the feeling that something about him isn’t right any more. Maybe there’s something in him that isn’t supposed to be there, or maybe something’s missing, but all of a sudden he can see further, shoot straighter, and walk more quietly on top of the snow than any full-grown man should be able to.

But he pushes all of that out of his mind because suddenly there’s a commotion outside, somebody is storming the warehouse they’ve been held in, and there’s shouts of _Captain America_ going up like a prayer. And look, Link’s heard of this guy, okay? This moron, prancing around selling war bonds like some dame, in tights and a helmet, acting like he has any right to call himself captain when he hasn’t fought a day in his life. So forgive him if he doesn’t have much faith in this so-called rescue mission.

But then there’s a man, big— _huge_ , really, he has to be six and a half feet if he’s an inch, and solidly built, broad shouldered and strong enough to rip the shackles chaining Link down right out of the table, and the first thing Link thinks is _huh, maybe this Captain America guy is more than he seems_ , and the second is—

“Rhett?”

Because the man standing before him might be a good foot and a half taller than the boy he left behind in Buies Creek, and the muscles, the set of his shoulders, the beard, those are all different, but that touch, that _face_ —Link would know it anywhere.

Rhett’s face breaks into a grin so bright it hurts Link’s eyes, after he’s spent so long in darkness, but Link isn’t about to close them. Even if this is just a vision, a fever dream, it’s the best damn thing he’s seen in a long while and he’s not about to miss out on a second of it.

“I thought you were dead, bo,” Rhett says, running a hand over Link’s forehead, checking for cuts or—maybe just checking to see if he’s real. God knows Link wants to do the same, but he can’t seem to move.

“I… thought you were smaller,” Link answers, dazed, and Rhett throws his head back and laughs. It’s the same booming laugh he’s always had, a laugh that fits this new body better, but the sound of it convinces Link that somehow, this is real. Rhett—this is Rhett, somehow. And he’s _here_.

(”Did it hurt?” Link asks him later, when they’ve blown up the base and marched victorious into camp.

“A little,” Rhett answers.

“Is it permanent?”

A sidelong grin, small and secret, like they’re back home, like nothing’s ever changed. Link feels like his heart is gonna crack in two. “So far.”)

 

When Link falls from the train, before the sickening crack of his body hitting the ice far below, while he’s hurtling through the air in what feels like slow motion, all he can think about is the solid heat of Rhett’s body when they’d curled together to keep warm at camp the previous night, and the way Rhett’s breath had ruffled Link’s hair as he slept. All he can think about as the cold wind whips at him is that feeling of home, in the middle of a warzone, and how he should’ve kissed Rhett’s pink, soft lips.

All he can think about is regret, and missed opportunities, and then he hits the ground and doesn’t think at all for another sixty years or so. Until—

 

“Link?”

The voice is familiar, somehow, but how can that be? The Asset doesn’t have memories, not of people, not like that. Only of kills, of missions and methods. And yet it stirs something in him, deep, deep in the recesses of his mind, something that smells like pine and tastes like bubblegum. The Asset has never had bubblegum.

“Who the hell is Link?”

The Asset has caused a great deal of pain over the years, but the look of anguish on the Target’s face is not one he’s ever seen before. This is a different kind of pain.

 

“The man on the bridge,” he asks his handlers, later, in the chair. “Who was he?”

“You met him earlier this week, on another assignment.”

The Asset shakes his head. “I knew him.”

The prep is excruciatingly thorough, but the wipe doesn’t take. When the Asset wakes, it’s with a name— _Rhett_ —on the tip of his tongue. He says nothing.

 

“ _You know me_ ,” the Target says as the Helicarrier falls, determination in his grey-green eyes never fading even as red spreads across his torso from the bullet wounds in his gut.

“ _No I don’t_ ,” the Asset yells, but it’s a lie, because this man is—is summer, and sunshine—

“You’ve known me your whole life,” the Target continues, as though the Asset hasn’t said a word—and the kind of warmth the Asset hasn’t felt in longer than he can remember—

“Your name is Charles Lincoln Neal,” this man, the Target, _Rhett_ , is—

“Shut up!” The Asset screams, and Rhett drops his shield, sending it plummeting into the river below, leaving him defenseless and open to anything the Asset might decide to do. When he speaks, he sounds exhausted.

“I’m not gonna fight you. You’re my friend.”

The Asset launches himself forward, pinning Rhett underneath him. “You’re my  _mission_ ,” he hisses, slamming his fist into Rhett’s face over and over and over. You’re my— _everything_ , he wants to say, but doesn’t. He doesn’t understand what it means, only that it’s true.

Rhett sighs, blinking up at him, unmoving. Not putting up a fight. “Then finish it. Because I’m with you til—the end of the line, bo.”

Link’s eyes go wide as he lets Rhett go, watching him fall into the rushing water.

 

The slam of his own body into the river a moment later is a shock to his senses, nerve endings he hasn’t felt for decades tingling as he peers through the wreckage. It’s hard work to drag Rhett onto the shore with his metal arm malfunctioning and his other arm broken in at least two places, but Link manages. He can hear sirens in the distance. He should run, he knows, get as far away as possible before anyone comes near the hiding place he’s made, but he doesn’t move until an ambulance appears and loads Rhett into the back. Only then does he make his escape.

He has work to do before he can come back to see Rhett, operatives to take down and bases to dismantle. He needs guns, and food, and money. He needs sleep. But before any of that, he has one last trip he has to make.

 

Standing in front of the exhibit, a baseball cap pulled low over his eyes, Link Neal observes his history. And he listens.

_Best friends since childhood, Link Neal and Rhett McLaughlin were inseparable in both the schoolyard and the battlefield…_


End file.
